


Just Text Me Later (UNFINSHED AND NO LONGER UPDATING)

by mulletprince



Category: Voltron Legendary Defender, Voltron: Legendary Defender, vld - Fandom
Genre: Annoying, College AU, F/M, I'll add more tags later, JUST, Lance is adorable, M/M, Multi, SO, WAIT THIS IS MY FIC MY HEADCANONS ARE CANON, Wrong Number AU, also, also keith has panic attacks like me, and amazing, because i project myself onto keith way too much, brah, broganes, but not really, head canon that they met over over watch, i guess a, i had pining keith on here earlier but now i guess..., just read the fic, lance is adorable;le, lance is just, oh wait i already mentioned that, okay so thats canon now, pi Ni ng LanNece, pining lance, texting au, who cares, why are you still reading the tags
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-25
Updated: 2017-12-06
Packaged: 2018-09-19 21:29:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 16,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9461123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mulletprince/pseuds/mulletprince
Summary: Keith has been talking to Blue-Waves, a friend on the internet for a month now. He's been helping him cope with life in general and Keith is starting to consider him one of his best friends. Now that he has to start junior year on a new campus, he's definitely gonna need a friend, because school is just- yeah.Lance met fire.lord4 about a month ago, and he's kind of in love. He knows he probably should be limiting his screentime when junior year starts but he can't help but keep talking to him, like every day. When he starts noticing Keith Kogane from his old art program is on the same chat client constantly, he gets suspicious.(Hey guys, sorry I suck at summaries. Here's a Klance AU where they're internet friends but they don't realize it. Hope you enjoy ^^)EDIT: I will be editing the summary a lot as I move along with the story, because I tend to write as I go.  Also, there is a slight warning if you feel uncomfortable reading about panic attacks, Keith has one at the end of chapter 4. There will be a warning right before though, so you can just skip that part if you want to and continue reading.UPDATE: I sometimes stream my writing process on instagram as @mulletweebcosplay.





	1. Shiro's a fucking hipster with his nerd glasses

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so this first chapter is hella boring I'm sorry. Just trying to set the stage, and stuff. Also, Keith's POV, if that wasn't obvious.

Keith's eyes were completely bloodshot, he realized as he stared into the mirror at 4 o'clock in the morning, with the harsh fluorescent lights of his bathroom turned on. "Fuck," Muttering, he rubbed his eyes and crouched down near the sink to splash water on his face. "Ugh, dratdratdrat." The exhausted 19 year old stumbled out of the room, flicking off the lights on his way out. He was dressed, but he realized that probably wouldn't help the fact that he looked like he had just pulled an all nighter playing some video game. Which, to be clear, he had not. 

He only stayed up until 12:00 pm, and he was talking with a friend. Still, he had woken up three times last night, thinking about bizarre things like where he would sit in class the next day. He probably had only gotten 5 hours of sleep.

Crashing onto his mattress, Keith realized he really had just an hour left to get somewhat of a good night's rest, so he tucked himself under the covers and closed his eyes. He was out like a light in less than a minute.

*** 

_Beep! Beep!_

Keith rolled over, and shoved his face into his pillow. "Ughhhhhh,"

 

_Beep! Beep!_

 

"Shuddup!" He mouthed into the pillow.

 

_Beep! Beep!_

"Okay, okay fine." The bed-headed teen rolled over and pushed himself up to a sitting position. He made a point to glare at his alarm clock and then slammed his fist down on the off button. Keith closed his eyes for a second, basking in what was left of his last hour of sleep before the first day of junior year and then hopped out of bed. Walking over to his bathroom, he turned on the lights. Looking into the mirror, Keith noted his eyes were slightly less red than they had been at 4 a.m. and he couldn't see the bags under his eyes as clearly anymore, so he figured the extra hour of rest had done some good.

Keith rubbed his eyes a bit to make everything slightly less blurry and peered into the mirror. 

"Fuck." _My hair is a mess._

He rummaged through his drawers and, pulling out a comb, went to work on his less than cooperative mullet. Closing his eyes, he relished the feeling of the brush scratching against his scalp, seeming to get rid of the itchiness that a thick head of hair can give you overnight. When he finished, he went back into his bedroom and plopped down on his bed. Tapping his fingers on the edge of the bed frame, he looked at his feet. _Oh yeah, I need shoes._ Keith tended to take a while to wake up fully.

After getting on a pair of red converse, Keith took about 2 seconds to realize he was starving. He was stumbling into the kitchen to make some toast when he realized Shiro was already awake, sitting at the counter, in full on dad mode. He was literally reading the newspaper and wearing those tiny glasses and everything. It looked ridiculous. "Shiro what the fuck?" Keith mumbled, making his way towards the pantry. Shiro didn't look up. "SHIRO!" His brother looked up at Keith and pulled out an earbud.

"Oh, hi Keith. You're up pretty late." He said, putting down his- Oh wait, it was the school newspaper. Okay, he was being a nerdy hipster, not a dad. "You sleep good?" The early bird took off his reading glasses and looked over to Keith, who was starting some toast.

"Eh," Keith got out the margarine, buttered his toast with it, and then walked over to the island to sit down next to Shiro.

"You excited for today?" Shiro took a sip from his coffee, and focused his attention on Keith. Keith just grunted. In truth, he was extremely excited, he had to tear himself off of the school's website yesterday afternoon, to stop himself from getting too psyched. But right now, he didn't really want to converse with Shiro. Sometimes he just wasn't in the mood.

Shiro picked up his newspaper again, and flipped through a few pages, before spreading out the document on the table in front of Keith. Keith looked up. Shiro had turned to the art section of the paper, and was pointing to an article below a picture of one of the summer classes' group photo. "You should read this bit about the drawing program for the first day."

"Already did," Keith mumbled around a mouthful of toast and margarine. Shiro looked up from the paper, surprised.

"Really? You actually visited the website like I told you?" he laughed. Keith just rolled his eyes. "Well, _I'm_ excited. I found out Matt's gonna be attending." Keith perked up at this.

"Is that why you were talking on the phone at the top of your lungs at ten p.m.?" Shiro looked back at the paper.

"And Allura will too, so I already-" Shiro hastily added,changing the subject.

Keith elbowed Shiro in the ribs, smiling. "Don't try to hide your internet boyfriend from me!" He grinned and put down his toast.

"He's not my-"

"Boyfriend?" Keith smirked and raised an eyebrow.

"Oh come on, Keith shut up." Shiro was blushing hard now and Keith loved it. Seeing his brother get like this was hilarious. He knew Shiro liked Matt, but his brother never wanted to admit it. The thing Keith didn't get was that he also seemed to have a mad crush on their friend Allura.

"Hah, well at least you have someone you know there," Keith murmured, stuffing another piece of toast into his mouth. Shiro looked up at this comment, slight concern clouding his face. 

"Hey, you do too! That kid Lance will be there. And I'm sure you'll make other friends too." Shiro replied.

Keith looked up at Shiro. “Who’s Lance?”

Shiro blinked, surprised. “He went to that art program with you. I talked to him sometimes before I picked you up? Tan, lanky? He said you two were rivals.”

Keith stared at his toast. “Oh!” He looked up at Shiro. “I remember him, the annoying one.” He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, no I don’t think I’ll end up even talking to him.”

Keith took another bite of toast and sighed. If only Blue was going. 

His full username was Blue-waves, and he was the guy that Keith had been talking to last night. He had the stupidest name, honestly, so Keith ended up just calling him Blue most of the time. They had been talking for a month, and Keith could almost swear this was the best internet friend he’d ever had. Scratch that, best friend in general.

Shiro was side-eyeing him.

“What?” Keith sputtered, almost worried from the grin creeping across Shiro’s face.

“You’re not even going to talk to him?” It was at that moment Keith realized his own mouth had been upturned in an unconscious smile, after thinking about Blue. He frowned suddenly, bringing his features back to the normal bitch-face mode. 

“What do you mean?” For a second Keith was worried Shiro had found out about Blue and had some crazy idea about them being in a relationship or-

“Lance! I just mentioned him, you avoided the subject, and then stared off into space for like 5 seconds smiling like a crazy person!” He laughed, then took a sip of his coffee.

Keith just sat there motionless. Lance. “Oh! Wait, you-wait…” Wait he thinks I like Lance? Keith broke out laughing. “Oh my god, Shiro, no. Again, I’ve talked to him like twice.”

Shiro looked up over his coffee mug, squinty eyed. “Okay.”

Keith scoffed and took a bite of his toast. “When’s the wifi coming back on?” He asked, putting down the piece of rather burnt bread. He was never good at cooking.

“The wifi’s off?” Shiro asked.

“Yeah, I was...” Keith paused. He definitely didn’t want Shiro to know about Blue now.  
“...watching a show last night and the internet cut out.” Shiro let out a huff and took a sip of coffee. 

“I’ll call the landlord at 9,” He muttered.

Keith groped for his water glass a couple times before realizing he hadn’t grabbed any. “Shit,” His comment earned a glare from Shiro. 

“You need to leave in half an hour.”

“Wait, actually?!” Keith rushed to get a glass of water, and gulped down the liquid, splashing some on his face. “Ughh…” Keith had planned on getting to school early, probably to just scope out the place, but also the people. I guess.

Spotting Shiro nearly grinning, Keith frowned. “You should have told me I was gonna be late earlier!” He gritted his teeth, honestly kind of mad now, and rushed to his room to get his backpack. Shiro looked up from his paper again, a confused expression playing across his face. 

“You have 30 minutes, and you already look like you washed. What’s the big deal?” Shiro carefully tucked up the newspaper and got up, walking over to the sink to wash his now-empty coffee mug. Keith grimaced. I don’t wanna be the stupid kid that comes in ten minutes late to class with a starbucks, Shiro.

“Nothing, I just want to be on time.” He muttered, trying to push away the idea that he might be able to get wifi at school and chat with Blue. Keith walked into his bedroom, and flicked the lights back on.

“Okay,” Shiro said, sounding cheeky. Keith sighed and walked over to the closet, then collapsed on the floor. He grabbed his backpack, which he had already packed yesterday, in his mad rush to be prepared for once in his life. 

I hope I at least make friends this year. Keith blinked a couple times as if the thought had just appeared randomly in his head, which it kinda had.

Wait, no I don’t need- He paused, and shook his head, starting to rummage through his bag, double checking that he had everything. I mean, I did fine last year. Keith knew this part was a lie, he had aced all his classes, but he also ended up…

Keith sighed again. This year will be different. And… maybe I will make some friends. Finishing up his assessment of the red bag, he patted his backpack a few times, and got up, slinging it over his shoulder.

As Keith hurried out the door, he turned to say goodbye to Shiro, who was still sitting at the table. He looked up from his paper as Keith turned and smiled. “Hey um,” Keith muttered, fidgeting with his hands. “Thanks,” 

“What did I do?” Shiro laughed softly, smiling. 

“Just- well you know I wouldn’t have a house if you didn’t take me in,” Keith rubbed the back of his neck, his mind briefly going back to getting kicked out of campus housing last year.

Shiro rolled his eyes. “You’re my brother, what was I supposed to do?” He got up and walked over to Keith with his arms stretched out. “Come on,” He said, when Keith just stood there. 

Keith leaned into his older brother’s arms, relishing the warmth he carried. “Wow, you need to take a shower,” Keith mumbled into his shoulder, which let out a laugh from Shiro. The brothers pulled apart and Keith smiled. “Thanks Shiro,”

Keith shrugged his shoulders, adjusting his backpack, and turned to the door. “See you later!” Shiro called, as he headed out the door. Keith took one last look over his shoulder and waved. Okay, time to go.


	2. Pidge is a terrifying force to be reckoned with

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally got the second chapter up! All your guy's comments make me so happy, btw ^^

The air was cold today, Lance noted, sitting on the bench outside Building A of Voltron Defender University. He stared at his phone, neck wrapped up in a home-knit scarf that draped over his right shoulder.  _ Agh, it's early... _ The 17 year old let out a muffled yawn and snuggled tighter into his scarf. Today was the day, the day he would finally be starting school on the upperclass campus. He would stay focused, get good grades, make some friends and-   
  
Suddenly a notification from his chat app popped up.   
  
**fire.lord4 has sent you a message** ****  
  
Lance grinned, sliding the notification to the right.   
  
**fire.lord4:** hey you up? I got to school.   
  
The grin on his face widened. Firey was the guy he met over a gaming chat a month or so ago, who he had started pming with. Apparently he lived in LA too, and he was always awake at like 2 am when Lance wanted to chat.   
  
**Blue-Waves:** Hii!!! Yes I’m up weirdo. I’ve been sitting around campus for like two hours.   
  
Lance waited a few seconds before a message popped up again.   
****  
**fire.lord4:** Isn’t it early where you are? I thought we had the same timezone.   
  
**Blue-Waves:** (e_e   
  
**fire.lord4:** do you just have a bank of emoticons saved to your phone or something?   
  
**Blue-Waves:** that is for me to know and you to never figure out   
  
**fire.lord4:** (e_e   
  
**Blue-Waves:** hEY   
  
**fire.lord4:** okay so for real though, im terrified for today   
  
**Blue-Waves:** oh yeah you said you were starting today too! I almost forgot, heh...   
  


**Blue-Waves:** don’t worry though, you got this

 

**fire.lord4:** (e_e   
  
**Blue-Waves:** oh my god this is going to be a thing isn’t it? WE HAVE A THING ALERT THE MEDIA ME AND FIREY HAVE A THING   
  
**fire.lord4:** did you just call me firey   
  
**Blue-Waves:** waht? Like firelord!   
  
**Blue-Waves:** omg wait. 

 

 **Blue-Waves:** Did you choose your name from avatar? ARE YOU ACTUALLY ZUKO  
  
**fire.lord4:** pfft  
  
**Blue-Waves:** NONONO YOU CAN NOT JUST PFFT ME!!! DID YOU???  
  
**fire.lord4:** okay yeah i may have watched avatar a few too many times as a kid  
  
**Blue-Waves:** as a kid??! Dude that show is my shit right now. Do you wanna stream it later?! O^O  
  
**fire.lord4:** oh my god you really do have a secret stash of emoticons  
  
**Blue-Waves:** FIREY LISTEN. DO YOU WANT TO STREAM AVATAR: THE BEST SHOW EVER TONIGHT  
  
**fire.lord4:** depends if i have homework  
  
**Blue-Waves:** ;”((((((  
  
**fire.lord4:** okay that one wasn’t even good  
  
**Blue-Waves:** hey DO NOT INSULT MY EMOTICONNING. I AM A MAJOR IN GRAPHIC DESIGN YOU WEEB. I KNOW MORE THAN YOU WILL EVER KNOW ABOUT ~the art of the emoji~  
  
**fire.lord4:** …  
  
**fire.lord4:** i need to go to class XD  
  
**Blue-Waves:** d-did you just… diD YOU JUST XD ME. YOU DISGUSTING LITTLE… YOU YOU  
  
**fire.lord4:** no seriously i need to go sorry! Bai  
  
**Blue-Waves:** AGH YOU AWFUL HUMAN BEING  
  
**Blue-Waves:** Okay, good luck though, don't stress out too much  
  
  
  
Fire stopped responding after that. Lance hummed a sigh. He knew Fire was probably telling the truth so he quit out of the chat application and checked the clock. 7:00 am exactly. He had been sitting around campus for two hours.  
  
“Remind me why I got to school this early,” He muttered to himself, stashing his phone in his pocket.  
  
“Because you always forget how late Hunk is to absolutely everything?” A voice perked behind him and Lance whipped around. A short haired, pale, rather androgynous looking girl stood behind him, green headphones around her neck. She sat down on the bench next to him.  
  
“Pidge! How long were you there?!” Lance stuttered, shoving his phone in his pocket.  
  
“A few seconds, Why? Are you hiding something?” She seemed rather uninterested, looking at her phone which she had taken out just as Lance had put his away. Less flustered now, Lance peered over at Pidge’s phone.  
  
“No, are you?” He answered, rather cheekily, before realizing she was on the NASA website, and that she was probably looking up stuff for class.  
  
Pidge looked up and rolled her eyes. Lance sat back down and sighed. _Well, I guess I probably should have known Hunk would be late…_ __  
  
Lance, looked over to Pidge, pouting. “Why did he say we should all meet here early again?” He asked, tapping his toes on the cement underneath the bench.  
  
“Because we haven’t seen Hunk in literally three months,” Pidge was still scrolling through her phone.  
  
“Ughh.” Lance pulled out his phone again, convinced Pidge would be too distracted to care about what he was doing. For some reason, even though he told them everything usually, Lance had delayed mentioning his internet friend to Pidge and Hunk. Mainly he was afraid they’d tease him; Well, Hunk wouldn’t, but he knew Pidge would. _Maybe I’ll tell Hunk if…_ Come to think of it, Lance couldn’t really think of a good time to mention his new found friend. _Shit._  
  
Having stared at the 7:04 at the top of his screen for long enough for it to turn to 7:05, Lance realized he wasn’t sure what he was doing with his phone out. _I could text Hunk._ He paused, remembering why Hunk wasn’t there in the first place. The guy had a serious problem getting out the door in the morning. _Nah, he’ll be ready quicker if I don’t distract him._ __  
  
Lance put away his phone again and draped his body over the bench, melodramatically. “Pidggggggeeee!”  
  
“Lance, what the hell are you doing?” His arms were hanging behind the bench and his legs were stretched out to cover as much space as possible, inevitably almost pushing Pidge off the bench. The lanky 17 year old groaned, staring at the sky.  
  
“Pidge, why are you so boring?” He asked, still in the rather precarious position of being about to piss off Pidge Gunderson.  
  
Lance paused for a second, wondering why the teen hadn’t immediately replied with a retort, and looked down when he started to hear rustling of a backpack.  
  
He was greeted with the lovely sight of Pidge’s hand, holding a water bottle, poised to open, upside down, over his crotch. “Ahh!” Like a cat about to be grabbed for a bath, he wriggled quickly out from the liquid threat and jumped up, about five feet away from Pidge.  
  
“How dare you! These are my favorite jeans and it’s like 2 degrees outside, are you crazy?!” He squeaked, feeling his pockets to make sure his phone hadn’t fallen out in his escapade to get away from the water.  
  
Pidge grinned, putting away her water bottle. “Maybe you should think before trying to push me off a bench?”  
  
Lance rolled his eyes, and groaned, sitting back down on the bench. __Okay Hunk better get here soon.

 

He realized he had started to daze off when Pidge elbowed him in the ribs and he nearly jumped. “Ah! What do you want?”

 

“Look!” She motioned to her phone, which was now showing a bunch of hideous school photos, each with a name underneath. Lance raised an eyebrow when Pidge clicked on one, then quickly hid her phone before the page could load. “Okay, so I was searching the online directory for anyone from last year- like I know nobody said they were going to continue to upperclass, but I thought maybe- anyways guess who I found!” Lance smiled giddily.

 

“Was it that cute girl Nyma, that I danced with at the New Years party?” Pidge’s grin dropped.

 

“You do remember she stood you up on your first date, right?

 

“Well…”  

 

Pidge shook her head. “Oh my god, Lance, okay anyways, no, but remember that kid that was my Chemistry partner the time we won that award?” She excitedly whipped out her phone, again. By now the page had loaded and there was a-  _ Oh my god is that Keith Kogane?! _

 

“WAIT A SECOND.” Lance grabbed her phone and peered at it. “You never said your partner that day was KEITH?!” He let out a huff. “I can’t believe you! He’s my rival, you know. You should have told me.”

 

Pidge looked at Lance, confused. “Wait, you’re  _ rival? _ Like the guy you used to talk about that you obviously had a huge crush on that-”

 

“Wait- Wait...” Lance sputtered his words, suddenly caught off guard. “What did you say?”

 

Pidge rolled her eyes. “Your mega crush from last year? The guy you said and I quote, I’m gonna one up him one day, I’ll be way fucking cuter than him? You’re trying to tell me you didn’t like him?”

 

_ I-I… no? I was just-  _

 

“Okay, okay, just stop right there. I did not like him, trust me. Pidge I would tell you the truth.” Lance let out a hesitant breath that he didn’t realize he had been holding.

 

“Okay, fine,” Pidge dropped the subject,  _ for once,  _ Lance noted. He looked back at the picture of Keith again, and paused, looking in his eyes for a second before handing back Pidge’s phone. They  _ had _ been purple. Lance had always thought that was weird, that he probably wore color contacts but… In this picture they seemed a duller shade, maybe almost gray. 

 

_ I wonder what was up that day…  _ He thought, the image of the boy’s sullen expression still present in his mind. He usually had seemed pretty annoyed, at least for the first semester when Lance had actually seen him around. Toward the end of the year, though, he switched out of their class, and he had only seen him again once.

 

“Hey guys!” Hunk’s excited voice interrupted his thoughts. Lance looked up to see his friend standing in front of him holding a covered container, a grin widening on his face. He set the container on the bench, and sat down. 

 

“Hunk!” Lance grinned, stopping his urge to rip the covering off of the container and see what Hunk made. “This,” he pointed to the container, “Better had be why you’re an hour late to our alleged _early morning reunion at SIX AM._ ” Hunk laughed and shoved Lance lightly.

“Come on you’re a morning person, and you know it. You probably were here half an hour early!” Lance smothered the grin on his face with his hand.    
  


“Okay- Um, first of all no, and second-”

 

“Lance, you texted me you that you wanted me to come at 5 am because you were bored.” 

 

Lance was quiet for a second. 

 

“You know what? You both are horrible,” He muttered, and directed his attention toward the thing Hunk had brought, as Hunk and Pidge started talking. He smiled to himself. Lance had missed Hunk over the summer. He had gone to Samoa to visit his mom’s side of the family for nearly the entire break, and… yeah, Lance had missed him. 

 

“Okay, Mr.Dreamy, I see much hasn’t changed, but wake up! You’ll really like what I brought!” Hunk’s attention was suddenly back on him. 

 

“Ah yeah! Let’s get this eating party started,” 

  
“Okay, so I know you prefer chocolate chip but….”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, ending on sort of a fade out of the scene here, hah, sorry if that's confusing for anyone. Anyways, since it would bug me for nobody to know Hunk made Fa'apapa for Lance and Pidge which is a Samoan coconut pastry kinda thing he learned how to make on his vacation. Also, fyi, if anyone see anything culturally incorrect, feel free to comment and lemme know, or pm me on my tumblr treerainbellabina.tumblr.com 
> 
> Thanks for reading this chapter guys!


	3. God Keith, why do you listen to The Wanted, I thought you were emo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay the chapter titles at this point are basically whatever I'm thinking about when i finish. like. i don't know how to name things okay? anyways I'm pretty proud of this chapter. If you could tell I took a while writing it, so yeah ^^

**fire.lord4:** no seriously i need to go sorry! Bai

 Keith put down his phone and took a breath. He fidgeted his feet and glanced around before picking up his phone again. 6:59. He didn’t have class for an hour, but he really did need to get off his phone, and like… _I don’t know, scout out the place._ He shoved his phone in his pocket as it beeped twice. _I’ll check later._ He sighed. Usually he was on the edge of his seat talking to Blue, but today… today all he could think about was being bombarded with first day of school _experiences._   

 That’s what Shiro liked to call them. “ _Come on Keith, come with me to this Zumba class! It’ll be an experience!” “Hey Keith wanna go do laser tag with Allura and I? It’ll be a fun experience!” “School will be fine. Getting out of the house more often will be a good experience!”_

 “Yeah right,” Keith muttered to himself, stretching his arms and standing up. He grabbed his backpack and started toward the arts building. _Building A._ He tugged his phone out of his pocket, grinned at the goodbye message from Blue and slid to the right, going into Itunes to pick some music for the walk. Kneeling down to fish his headphones out of his backpack, he looked around, noticing a sign pointing to the direction of Buildings A and B.

 Keith put in his earphones. He started down the cement path that lead towards what looked like a garden, and hopefully ended up near the art building. Looking down to his phone still in his hand, he pressed shuffle on his playlist. Keith hummed lightly as the music started up. _The sun goes down. The stars come out. And all that counts is here and now._ A small grin formed on his lips as he walked.

 Looking down at the cement, Keith’s mind drifted toward school. _My universe, will never be the same. I’m glad you came, I’m glad you came._ Starting to mutter the words to himself, he tapped his fingers on his thigh. Was he going to make friends today?

Keith was embarrassed that's what he seemed to be worrying about the most. _You don’t make friends on the first day of school. That’s realistic fiction bullshit._ He sighed.

 “You cast a spell on me, spell on me,” Keith didn’t realize he was singing as he entered the vegetable garden and made his way through the raised boxes of dirt, not yet planted at the start of the year. “ You hit me like the sky fell on me, fell on me,”

 As he started to tune out, the nagging thought of Blue creeped back into his head. _Will I have time for Avatar tonight?_ He probably wouldn’t have any homework that he couldn’t finish in his free period.

 “And I decided you look well on me, well on me,” Keith could see the tall gray building that was probably the destination he was looking for as he exited the garden. He walked quickly now, rounding the corner. “So let's go somewhere no one else can see, you and me.” His voice rang clear.

 Keith’s eyes widened as he passed the edge of the building. There were three people sitting and standing, eyes wide, looking at him.

 Keith shut his mouth like there was a bug about to fly inside. He just stood there for a few seconds, the other students not saying a thing. Suddenly, when he didn’t think anything could make this silence more awkward he realized his eyes were resting on- _Oh my God, is that Lance?_

  _Stay with me, I can make, make you glad you came._

 Keith pulled his earphones out.

 He watched Lance’s eyes widen.

 “Keith?!” Lance jumped up, the boy behind him stumbling back. Keith froze, if he could be even more still than he was already. “Oh my god, Pidge, you were right!” Lance was grinning, hands waving. He turned around and motioned to the other guy and the girl. “Guys this is Keith!”

  _You were right? What does that mean?_ Keith really hoped he wasn’t blushing out of embarrassment.

 The girl in the back seemed to have recovered from having been interrupted by a singing weirdo, enough to speak at least. When she stepped up to stand next to Lance, Keith realized it was Pidge, his old lab partner in Chemistry. _Oh._

 “Lance, I know who he is, I’m just wondering why he was singing a song by The Wanted.” Pidge was smirking as she walked up to Keith. “I thought you only liked emo music,” Pidge scoffed, holding out a hand. Keith shook it and smiled nervously. Pidge’s face was relaxed; she didn’t seem to be as startled by his interruption.. Anyways, she seemed to be pretty chill. Keith breathed in.

 “Uh, Keith? Retort? Angry grumble? Something?” Keith realized he hadn’t said anything.

 “Eh, I- um,” _Okay, still can’t really speak._ “I have guilty pleasures,” He muttered, rubbing the back of his head. He looked down, but his head shot straight back up at the sound of Lance’s voice.

 “Guilty pleasures?!” He was almost squealing with laughter. Keith had a feeling he was still red. Keith let out a sigh. Yep, this was definitely the Lance he knew. He scanned Lance’s appearance as he stood there awkwardly. He seemed taller than last year, still freckled, and was wearing a light blue scarf that kind of let out the color in his eyes. His hair was neat, but still maintained a bit of energy, curling up around his face. He-

 “Hey!” Keith’s thought process was interrupted by an extremely energetic Lance, who was now up in his face, poking his chest. “You seem like you tune out more than me! Were you even listening?!” Keith shook his head, frazzled.

 “Wait, you were talking?” He now noticed Pidge looking at him expectantly. Somehow he had tuned out everything that was happening in the past few seconds. He shook his head. “Agh, I’m sorry- I...”

 Suddenly Pidge spoke up. “He does that a lot. He’s actually probably more of a daydreamer than you, Lance,” She laughed. Keith was grateful for the cover. He was a dreamer, and it tended to get him in trouble quite a bit when he tuned out. _But wait, Lance does that too?_

 Suddenly the bigger guy who had been standing in the back came forward. “Uhm, sorry guys, but I was wondering, am I going to be actually introduced to-” He glanced at Keith. “I’m Hunk. Your name is...?”

 Before he could answer Lance jumped in front of him again. Keith sighed and rolled his eyes. “Did you not hear me? This is Keith, my old rival, the guy who swore he would never listen to pop music, not once!”

 Keith blinked, trying to process everything he was saying. Damn, Lance talked faster than he remembered.

 “Did you say I was your rival?” He asked, tilting his head, brows knitted together.

 “Uhm, yeah. You know, last year, we were in Design Arts together?” Lance turned around. “Yeah, Lance and Keith, neck and neck, competing for the top grade in Design Arts!” He gestured wildly as he talked, not taking a second to breath before saying more. “I was always the better artist but I was like one percent behind you in the gradebook.” He exaggerated a pout.

 Pidge let out a cackle. Keith had noticed her watching Lance’s rambling go on with a glint in her eyes. _I wonder if…_ He shook his head. Pidge would never go for a guy like Lance. She was probably just amused by his antics. Keith sighed for like, the fourteenth time that morning. He had to admit, Lance had captured his attention more than once last year but- “Wait, we were not rivals.” He spoke up, interrupting Lance’s rant.

 Lance turned back to Keith, looking him square in the eyes, mouth open. “Wh-at?”

 Keith almost scoffed. God, this kid was dramatic. “Um, I never signed up for a rivalry with you.” He was talking rather non-chalantly now, singing incident almost forgotten. “Not my fault you couldn’t catch up.”

 Lance screwed up his eyes to match the grimace forming on his face. Time seemed to freeze for a second as his babbling ceased. “Hey, I got ahead of you when you quit.” His tone was accusing, almost angry, Keith realized.

 Keith could hear a sharp inhale from Pidge.

 “Look it wasn’t for me, okay?” He waved his hand casually, and pushed past a crossed arms Lance, who was still standing in front of him. His chest tightened though as he walked and his breathing quickened.

 Sitting down on the bench, he looked up. Pidge was starting to whisper something in Lance’s ear, and his heart dropped. “Hey, Pidge!” She turned around, adjusting her glasses. “You don’t need to explain okay?”

 Lance’s eyes were wide. “I-,”

 Hunk was standing to the side, awkwardly, Keith noticed, looking at Lance with pity.

 “No, stop.” Keith replied, looking down at his lap. “I was getting stressed out and I switched classes okay? That’s all, and that’s the truth.” He let out a shaky breath. This was not what he needed this morning, another reminder of last year. _God, Lance._ He was always causing problems.

 When Keith had talked about him to Shiro this morning he might have been leaving out a few important details that he had almost completely pushed away himself. How this kid was always trying to talk to him in class about his projects, how Keith hadn’t ever responded nicely, how he always ended up feeling guilty for pushing away someone so friendly. But… this is Lance he was talking about. He was annoying, and a pest, and just- _Ugh._

 Keith looked up. He was still on the bench. Hunk was sitting to the side of a dark blue backpack that Keith realized probably belonged to one of them. Pidge was sitting on the other side, looking at her lap nervously.  Lance was standing off near Pidge, no bench room left for him, eyes on his feet. _Oh fuck, now I’m sitting in his seat._

 He breathed in deeply, got up and grabbed his bag. “Hey, um, I gotta go,” He muttered, slinging the backpack over his shoulder. Pidge looked up, suddenly, but Keith didn’t have time to read her expression. He was already walking into Building A. _That was why I came here anyway right, to go to class. Why am I wasting my time with other kids?_

 He heard a muffled gasp, _probably from Lance_ , but he didn’t turn around. The guy had fucked up. You don’t just mention- _Well, I guess he didn’t really know what happened so…_ Keith sighed and pushed open the door, without looking back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just a reminder, I LOVE WHEN YOU GUYS LEAVE COMMENTS. LIKE IT MAKES MY DAY. so just, thank you so much. I've received a lot of wonderful feedback and that makes me really happy, but don't be afraid to leave constructive criticism too! I know this definitely isn't perfect and I'd love to hear anyone's ideas for what could make it better.


	4. oh my god Keith you emo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Okay so I finally made another chapter! Sorry for the long wait, con season came up and I got distracted going to Wondercon and working on cosplays and shit, whoops. Anyways I'm on vacation now, so hopefully the next chapter will come out soon. 
> 
> Also, disclaimer, I literally just woke up, ate breakfast and typed out this chapter so I think it's pretty good, but if it's horrible I apologize. 
> 
> TRIGGER WARNING: This is a chapter where Keith has a panic attack. There will be a thing that says (TW) right before it happens so you can read as much as possible without getting triggered.

 

 **fire.lord4 has sent you a message**   
  
**fire.lord4:** UGHHHHHHHH   
  
**Blue-Waves:** okay, what’s wrong?   
**  
** **fire.lord4:** nothing   
  
**Blue-Waves:** (e_e   
  
**Fire.lord4:** just… you know like, anxiety?   
  
**Blue-Waves:** yes, I am aware of the term.   
  
**Fire.lord4:** no, I mean, that’s what’s wrong.   
  
**Blue-Waves:** oHH   
  
**Blue-Waves:** oh man that sucks  >< do you need to vent or anything or??

 

 **fire.lord4:** nah. Just… distractions would be good   
  
**Blue-Waves:** ooh mmkay! Well…

 

Lance looked up as Hunk nudged his shoulder. “Dude! We’re having our first lunch as high school juniors and you’re on your phone?” Lance scowled.

“I’m consoling a friend okay?” He replied, tone harsh. Hunk looked surprised at this. Usually Lance was upbeat, the friendliest of their group but today, he seemed off.

“Woah, okay! You don’t have to get all ticked off at me. I didn’t know.” _Shit he’s right. Ugh, I have not been on my game today._

“Sorry man. I just- I’ve…” Hunk gave him a sympathetic look.  
“I know. You’re just stressed out because of school, right?” Usually they seemed to share a mind, Lance and Hunk. They tended to finish each other’s sentences, know exactly what the other was thinking, and exactly how to soothe eachother. But today, Hunk couldn’t have been more wrong.

“No, just…” Lance sighed. He picked up his phone again and leaned on Hunk’s shoulder. His lunch, chicken fingers and fries had barely been touched, and it was almost halfway through lunch.

“Lance, buddy, my man, my dude-bro, are you okay?” _Ugh, now I have Pidge’s attention too._ Pidge was leaning over the table, peering at Lance like he was a dna sample ready to be examined for spliced pieces.

“Yes, I’m fine.” Lance muttered, sliding open the lock button on his phone. He noticed Pidge sharing a confused look with Hunk, but then, thankfully, she went back to eating her peanut butter and jelly sandwich.   
  
**fire.lord4:** hey are you okay?   
  
**Blue-Waves:** ah sorry, got distracted. My friend got annoyed with me for being on my phone at the table   
  
**fire.lord4:** ah! You should be hanging out with them! I didn’t know you were with people!   
  
**Blue-Waves:** NONONO you need comfort rn. I’m here, I wanna help you with your anxiety shit   
  
**fire.lord4:** heh   
  
**Blue-Waves:** okay, so. Tonight we’re watching avatar right?

  
**fire.lord4:** cadlsjcbnsdjolcv   
  
**Blue-Waves:** WHAT THE HECK IS THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN???   
  
**Fire.lord4:** i might have homework   
  
**Blue-Waves:** FIREY GIVE ME A CLEAR ANSWER: YES OR NO   
  
**fire.lord4:** oh god we’re back to that   
  
**Blue-Waves:** back to what?   
  
**fire.lord4:** “firey”   
  
**Blue-Waves:** yes, that’s your pet name

  
**fire.lord4:** ???!!???   
  
**Blue-Waves:** okay, so we’re watching avatar tonight. What else are you gonna do?   
  
**Blue-Waves:** wait what are you doing rn? Aren’t you in school?   
  
f **ire.lord4:** lunch

 

 **Blue-Waves:** ahhhhhh thats cool!

 

f **ire.lord4:** go hang out with your friends blue, I’m feeling better, okay?

 

 **Blue-Waves:** no wait hey you haven’t answered my question!

 

 **Blue-Waves:** fireyyyyy

 

 **Blue-Waves:** okay so now you’re ignoring me? So i can hang out with my friends? You little shit  >:U

 

 **Blue-Waves:** dude, i can see that you’ve read this

 

 **Blue-Waves:** come onnnn

 

f **ire.lord4:** go HANG OUT WITH YOU FRIENDS

 

 **Blue-Waves:** yes! A response!   
  
f **ire.lord4:** I’m gonna put you on mute until 6 pm tonight. Then we can watch avatar and i won’t be distracting you.

 

 **Blue-Waves:** ????? fuq no

 

 **Blue-Waves:** wait

 

 **Blue-Waves:** firey is the cutest bean ever, he is beautiful and cute and a kitten

 

 **Blue-Waves:** omg you are on mute

 

 **Message “** firey is the cutest bean ever, he is beautiful and cute and a kitten” **deleted**

 

Lance sighed and put his phone down and looked around. Hunk was engrossed in an argument with Pidge about something science-sounding, Matt, Pidge’s brother was busy on his laptop, typing frantically, and some senior was on his phone at the end of the table. _So much for making new friends first day of school._ Lance sighed again and got up, grabbing his lunch tray, but quickly setting it down again. Hunk, he realized, was now too engrossed in his argument with Pidge to notice him standing up.

Lance glanced over to the senior at the end of the table, who was now getting up, shoving his phone in his pocket. He couldn’t exactly recognize him with his glasses off that that was okay. He grinned. Time for some fun.

Tapping Hunk’s shoulder, Lance kept his eyes on the senior. Hunk turned around, looking surprised at finding Lance behind him instead of next to him. “You ready for an old-school Hunk and Lance lunchtime prank?” He asked, smirking. Hunk’s eyes lit up.

“When wouldn’t I be?”

Pidge leaned over the table again, pushing her glasses up her nose. “Hey can I join in this time?”

“Sure!” Lance smiled. Maybe his day would end up going okay. He sat back down, and motioned for the others to come closer.  “Okay,” he whispered, “ You see that senior over there? He’s about to throw away his lunch.”

“How do you know?” Hunk asked, more curious than surprised. He knew Lance’s people-assessing abilities.

“He just put his phone away, and he’s been typing on it the whole time. He looks like he’s about to head somewhere.” Lance paused, sneaking a look back at the senior. “Okay, Pidge, how fast can you rig a trash can trap?”

“Wait are you planning on doing that thing where we spurt the ketchup in his face? What if someone comes to the trash first?”

Now it was Hunk’s turn to interject. “I can distract them. Tell them we’re the green committee or something, counting the number of recycling vs. trash.”

Lance smiled. This plan was coming together perfectly. “Pidge, how long do you need?”

“Okay, um, I haven’t done this in a while, and I need to go to the table to get the ketchup, so give me about six minutes.”

“Okay, cool. I’ll distract him,” At this Lance pushed the others away. The senior was starting to grab his tray and about to stand up. Lance slid in right next to him, and tapped his shoulder.

The senior turned around. At first Lance’s breath caught in his throat. This was Takashi Shirogane! How had he not noticed earlier? Definitely not a senior. _Whatever, the prank must go on. At least I can distract him better now._

“Hey, Shiro, top substitute in the district, how are you doing?”

“Ah, Lance McClain! Good how are you?”

Lance gawked slightly. _He remembered me!_

“Hah, yeah, that’s me.” _Since when did this get so nerve-wracking? God, I’m out of practice._ “So, I was wondering, are you going to be a full-time teacher this year, or...” _Oh my god, Lance stop being such a weirdo, he’s gonna catch onto you asking stupid questions like that._

Thankfully Shiro just ran a hand through his hair and smiled. “Oh yeah, you’re probably wondering if you’ll be getting any more easy classes this year, huh?” He scoffed. _Well, he’s kind of right, whenever he taught class he let us do whatever we wanted._ “Don’t worry, this year, I’m teaching AP Design and Illustration, so you’ll be getting me again.” He grinned, almost evilly, Lance noted, at this statement.

Lance just gaped. This was going to be his major teacher? Taskashi Shirogane? _Oh my god._ As Shiro started to walk away, Lance could feel his palms sweating even more. Of course, this meant his first reaction would be to stick out his hand of a handshake. _Stupid, stupid, stupid._

“Um, well I’m excited to be in your class this year.” He stuttered, as Shiro took his hand and shook it.

“I’m excited to have you as my student!” With this Shiro started heading across the cafeteria towards the trash can. _Oh god, WAIT._ Lance manically started motioning to Hunk and Pidge to stop, but they were both intently working on the trash can. As Shiro got closer and Hunk moved away, Lance’s heart began to beat in his chest. He closed his eyes.

 

*  *  *

“Keith?” Shiro’s voice groaned over the phone as soon as Keith had picked up the call.

“Yeah? Did something happen?” Keith grumbled over a mouthful of pizza. He was sitting on a beanbag in the library, a paper plate on the keyboard of his computer as he ate and surfed tumblr.

“Yeah, um, I was wondering. Are you still not planning on becoming friends with this Lance kid?”

Keith perked up in his seat. “Why?”  
“I suggest staying far away from him as possible. He just played a prank on me.” Keith almost spit out his pizza.

“Wait, what did he do?” This returned a loud sigh from Shiro.

“Oh, not much. Just had a nice conversation with me, before getting his friends to set up a device that squirts ketchup in the victim’s face when they throw something in the trash.” Keith couldn’t help but laugh. He could imagine Shiro, right now, paper towel in hand, just having finished wiping ketchup off his face.

“So what did you do to them?” Keith asked, after swallowing.

“Ah nothing big, just afternoon detention, but god, you’d think juniors would know better,” Keith paused. Detention? Lance was getting in detention on the first day of school? Wait.

“Who were the other kids? Did you get their names? Shiro? This is important!”

After a small pause, Shiro answered. “Um, yeah, Pidge and Hunk. Why?” Keith felt his stomach lurch. No, Pidge couldn’t get detention on her first day. She was probably freaking out. And from what Keith had seen of Hunk this morning, a guy who cooked baked goods for his friends the first day of school? He didn’t deserve to be there either. Lance, well… who cared about Lance? He was just… Keith sighed. He didn’t want to see him in detention either.

“Shiro, can I ask you a big favor?” Keith put his laptop aside, and grabbed his paper plate with a pizza slice left and walked over to the trash can.

“What?” Shiro’s voice sounded more concerned than anything else. “Is something wrong?”

“No, just… can you maybe make their punishment less harsh? Like um, maybe assign them more homework or something?” He could hear a pause on the other end of the line, then the noise of Shiro getting up.

“Why?”

“No reason. Just… well…” Keith could almost hear Shiro grinning on the other line. Keith was fully aware that if he didn’t come up with a good reason in the next two seconds Shiro would be set in his decision that he liked Lance or something equally crazy. “Yeah, um, me and Pidge we chemistry partners remember?”

“Yes, and?”

“Well, she helped me a lot, and I kind of owe her, so if you could just do this for me?” Shiro groaned.

“Fine,”

“Wait really?”

“Yes, I said fine. I don’t really want them to think of me as the harsh teacher either. They seemed terrified when I talked to them after the incident,” He laughed at this. Keith sighed. _Thank goodness_.

“Ah, thank you so much Shiro. I owe you one, okay?” Shiro let out another laugh.

“Yeah, sure, whatever, little bro. I love you!”  
“I love you too, Shiro. Bye.” Keith hung up and threw the rest of his pizza in the trash. He let out a sigh and turned to go back to where he was sitting. _Okay, so…_

Trying hard as possible not to decode exactly why he had just done what he did, he sat down at his laptop again. Scrolling through tumblr, suddenly a message popped up in the corner of his screen.

 

**Blue-Waves has sent you a message**

 

 **Blue-Waves:** IM DONE HANGING OUT WITH MY FRIENDS WILL YOU TALK TO ME NOW??   


Keith smiled. Blue always seemed rambunctious when he texted. Full of life, and shit.  


**fire.lord4:** heh, sure

 

 **Blue-Waves:** okay so you won’t believe how my day is going

 

 **Blue-Waves:** first, I have a reunion with super emo angsty kid from sophomore year, and theN i and up realizing he’s gonna be in my class

 

 **fire.lord4:** excUSE ME WE PREFER TO BE CALLED EMOTIONAL. EMO IS A SLUR.

 

 **Blue-Waves:** …

 

 **Blue-Waves:** did you just make… like a good joke? FIREY WHAT IS WRONG DO YOU NEED ASSISTANCE

 

 **fire.lord4:** okay yup I’ve been spending too much time on tumblr, i need to chill out for a minute, apologies

 

 **Blue-Waves:** noNONO NEW JOKEY FIREY IS ADORABLE

 

 **fire.lord4:** *slides back into hole of emo, stoic, amazingness* excuse me what did you just call me

 

 **Blue-Waves:** _a-d-o-r-a-b-l-e_

 

 **fire.lord4:** _f-u-c-k y-o-u i-m t-o-o c-o-o-l t-o b-e a-d-o-r-a-b-l-e b-u-t t-h-a-n-k y-o-u f-o-r t-h-e c-o-m-p-l-i-m-e-n-t_

 

**Blue-Waves is typing...**

 

 **fire.lord4:** you’ve been typing for a while dude, is there a problem?

 

 **Blue-Waves:** HOW THE HECK DID YOU TYPE THAT ENTIRE THING SO QUICKKLY THISISSOFUCKINGHARDUGH

 

 **fire.lord4:** i sold my soul to the devil to be amazing at typing

 

 **Blue-Waves:** you emo

 

 **fire.lord4:** ugh lunchtime is ending adsjcnaljdcn

 

 **Blue-Waves:** wait me too?? Okay, so we both live in cali, we both have lunch at the literal exact same time down to the minute, and we both start school at the same time. Are you getting what im saying?

 

 **fire.lord4:** um… no?

 

 **Blue-Waves:** FIREY I THINK WE MIGHT GO TO THE SAME SCHOOL

 

 **fire.lord4:** cdaokjclnasdljkcndj

 

 **fire.lord4:** nkalscnaldkcnadklncadklncladk

 

 **fire.lord4:** acnklnadlkcnbdaklcnvadklsncfklnadlkfcnadskljfnalksfndkalncaslk excuse me i need to go to class

 

 **Blue-Waves:** Wait no, I didn’t want you to react like that!! No wait firey

 

 **Blue-Waves:** firey?

 

Keith stood up, smacked his computer closed and set it down on the table. He breathed in heavily. What was this feeling in his stomach? He decided to sit back down. Yeah, that was a good idea. _Okay. So Blue goes to the same school as me. Blue, funny, excited, amazing, fantastic Blue. Fuck. What if I’ve already met him? Oh my god.. Oh my god, what if he was here last year and saw what happened and oh my god oh my god oh my-_

**(TW)**

Keith’s train of thought was interrupted as he heard footsteps coming into his section of the library.

“Oh Keith! Fancy seeing you here.” Keith looked up at the sound of a low voice that sent shivers down his arms.

“Oh. Rolo. Hi.” He muttered quickly. He certainly, definitely did not have time to deal with his ex right now. Almost without thinking, he got up, grabbed his laptop and shoved his way past him.

“Oh my god dude, don’t be so pushy- Wait where are you…” Keith couldn’t hear him anymore and that was good. The problem was now he couldn’t hear anything. He looked around the library frantically, tension rising in his stomach. He felt like he could almost choke.

“Keith?” Keith’s eyes searched for the sudden voice, and locked on Shiro, who was at the double-doors near the front desk. He raced over to him and reached out, wrapping his brother in a boa-constrictor hug, which was tightly returned. Shiro would know what was going on. Shiro knew how to deal with his panic attacks.

Keith remembered his breathing techniques, as Shiro rubbed his back. He could feel his heart rate slowing, his stomach unknotting. He breathed in and out quietly.

“Keith, you’re okay.” Shiro’s voice was affirming.

“Can we sit down?” Keith asked shakily.

“Yeah, of course.” Shiro led them to some chairs set up by a table, thankfully opposite where Rolo had been standing. Keith breathed heavily. “Do you wanna talk?” Shiro coaxed gently.

“No, I just-” Keith sighed, the tension in his stomach finally releasing completely. He looked up at his brother. “I’m good. Just overstimulation.” Shiro pulled him in for another hug, which he returned gratefully. “Thanks dude.”

“No problem.”  
“I need to get to class, and the librarian is staring at me weird, so I should probably go,” Keith said, starting to get up.

“Okay, are you sure?” Shiro asked, concern clearly visible on his face.

Keith stood up, relieved he didn’t get a shock of dizziness that usually occurred after events like this. “Yeah, I’m good,” He forced a smile, to show Shiro he was fine and landed a hand on his shoulder.

“Okay, I’m gonna walk you to your next class.”

“Ugh fine, dadddd,” Keith whined. Shiro smiled and stood up, ready to lead him into whatever was next. Keith smiled internally, for real this time. _Thank God, he’s here._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah okay that was one hell of a chapter. If you didn't notice, theres a few things I changed in the middle of writing. Shiro is now a full-time teacher at the school, which I didn't mention earlier in the story because i honestly had no idea he would become one XD. Also, I added in a plot point that you might have missed in the middle of Keith freaking out; Rolo is Keith's ex. They didn't break up so horribly and they would technically still be friends if Keith wasn't embarrassed. Basically what happened last year with Keith's is why they broke up.
> 
> Anyways, the big reveal is coming soon, so look out for that! Klance is starting to happen guys!
> 
> (Also, remember I'm always open to constructive criticism because I know by all means this fic is not perfect. And if you liked the comic, please comment below what parts you thought were good! I kind of feed off of comments to keep going, heh, and your guy's comments on the last chapter were what inspired me to just speed-write this one this morning. Without you guys I might not have gotten back to this fic, so thank you very much, and I don't mind you pestering me to write new chapters, as long as it doesn't get out of hand.)
> 
> (One more thing, I might have art for this in the future?? Idk)


	5. oh fuck Lance is screwed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yey I got a chapter out relatively quickly. Um, so heres chapter 5 I guess.. Sorry it's so short, but I'm really looking forward to the next chapter so? I hope this tides you over. Thanks so much for all the nice comments and feedback. I always get really excited when I see the notification in my inbox. So yeah, heres the chapter.

Lance trudged through the hall, the weight of his backpack feeling like fifty tons of steel.  _ Ughhhh.  _ He knew he should be feeling happy. Shiro had come to him a few minutes after the prank had played out horribly, and he informed him that he would be revoking his punishment. 

Because of Keith.

But anyway, that wasn’t the point, and was definitely not the reason he was feeling horrible. Right after Shiro had left, Lance had started on his way back to Building A. And on the way there, that’s when he had been texting Firey. And when Firey had stopped talking.

Lance shoved a hand up to his face to rub his eyes. He had totally freaked him out.  _ Why would I even suggest that we go to the same school? That’s weird, right?! We’re not that close yet!  _ The thought stung, but Lance kept walking. He knew at this point his feelings for Firey weren’t exactly the “internet friend” type, but he couldn’t really sort that out in his head. Just, everything seemed convoluted when he was thinking about him.

Finally he arrived by the door to room 4B. Grabbing the handle, he swung open the door to an empty classroom. At first he was surprised. _ Why the heck is nobody here? _

He pulled out his phone to check the time.  _ Oh duh…  _ Class started in seven minutes. Lance dragged his feet to the front desk and sat down, unloading his backpack onto the seat next to him. He whistled listlessly as he stared at the desk.  _ Why dID I TELL HIM THAT? We probably don’t go to the same school, and I made stupid assumptions and…  _ He sighed.

_ But what if he does go here?  _ The thought had been on his mind all day. He barely knew anybody in the secondary section of his high school. Usually, when kids had to move to the second campus for junior year, they switched out or more kids moved in. That left Lance with just his two best friends and Allura as his only acquaintances.  _ Oh and Keith.  _

Still, the idea that he could have been passing Firey in the halls all day was… well interesting at least. Exciting? Lance didn’t know, but he had a feeling he would be paying closer attention to his classmates this period than the last. 

Lance hummed a tune to some MKTO song, drumming his fingers on the desk. He soon was closing his eyes and shaking his hips to the beat in his head. 

Suddenly the door opened. Lance stopped immediately and looked up. A girl with olive gray hair, cut into a bob around her face walked into the room. Lance recognized her immediately.

“Shay!” He waved from the front seat, smiling.

“Oh, Lance!” The corners of Shay’s eyes crinkled as she grinned and took a seat next to him. “I haven't seen you yet today. How are you?” Lance gave her a thumbs up in response, which he knew was cheesy, but honestly didn’t really care about. Shay laughed. “Ah, corny as every I see!” 

“Hey, I am  _ not _ corny,” Lance exaggerated a pout and crossed his arms, but he apparently couldn’t hold that position for long. Almost getting up he gestured his arms wildly. “I am the most fabulous man, and you just can’t handle my radiance!” He joked. Shay laughed again and Lance smiled.  Seeing someone who didn’t make fun of you when you did stupid things was always comforting. “So what are you doing here anyway?” Lance asked. “Switched school districts to be closer to Hunk?” at this he leaned over the table and raised his eyebrows mockingly. 

Shay grinned. “Hah, no. Our family moved houses and now we happen to be closer to here, so? Yeah.” She paused for a second, looking down at her feet, a blush covering her face, Lance noticed. “However, being around Hunk more will be nice.” She looked up at Lance. 

_ Wow, her eyes are really pretty when she’s happy. I can see why Hunk likes her.  _ Lance gave a thumbs up again. 

“Well, um, yeah! That’s... Cool! I’m happy for you guys,” He stuttered heavily, suddenly hit with a shock of nausea. He felt warmth crowd into his cheeks and the sudden thought of watching Avatar tonight was on his mind. Was he nervous about Firey again? No that must be...  _ Oh duh. I’m staring at a pretty girl. Hah, chock it up to the old hormones.  _

Suddenly the door busted open, and a crowd of students walked in. Lance turned to see the popular kids of Voltron file in, loud conversations jarring his senses. He almost flinched. “Well I guess I should introduce you to the students,” He started but Shay was already standing up waving to-  _ Wait is that Nyma?!  _ Lance sat, gawking.

“Oh my god! Shay, hi!” Nyma’s voice was light and friendly as she paused in the flow of kids trying to find their seats. Nothing like the salty tone she had used with him when he had called her after New Years.

“Hi Nyma! God, I haven’t seen you in ages! How are you doing?” Shay was acting like she had known Nyma for years.

“Ah, I’m good, how about you?” Lance eyed Nyma speaking, her high blonde ponytails waving lightly to frame her face. He could feel a blush creeping up his cheeks and stared down at the table. He clicked his teeth, annoyance and guilt stirring in his stomach. 

Apparently he had been looking down for a long time, because when he raised his head again, Nyma was already on the other side of Shay, chatting busily. Lance let out a sigh.  This was the girl that stood him up, after being the first one to even agree to going on a date with him. Lance had laughed it off with Hunk, as her being a jerk, but now that his feelings for her were obviously still evident, he knew that was probably a joke. After all Shay liked her, so there must have been something wrong with him.

His thoughts were stopped in their tracks as he noticed a familiar mullet-head hurrying in behind the line of kids entering the room. Keith didn't even seem to notice what he was doing, Lance noted as he came… and sat right next to him? 

“Er, hey buddy…”Lance started off, immediately feeling awkward as he tried to catch Keith’s attention, maybe make him aware of what the heck he was doing?

Keith snapped his head around. “Wha- Oh!” He paused, realization seeming to dawn on his face. “Oh, hi Lance.” Lance just kind of stared as he looked back down at his bookbag, expression unreadable.

“Are you, um, feeling better?” Keith turned to look at him unusually fast as Lance spoke, and then just stared. 

“Oh.” He looked back down. “Sure,”

Lance frowned. Here was his rival, his- no, not his enemy, his  _ something, _ who had just saved his butt from detention, so clearly he cared about him but-  _ wait, why would I care? This is ridiculous.  _

Lance softened his pout and looked at his computer screen that he had opened earlier. Talking to Firey would fix this. 

Then of course, he realized Firey was probably still upset. He rolled his eyes and put his fists down on the table. Keith turned quickly, looking up from his phone, startled.  _ Oh come on, you wanted to sit next to me. For some… reason.  _

Keith looked back down at his phone and typed frantically. Lance huffed.

 

* * *

 

Keith typed on his phone quickly, trying to finish his sentence before Shiro walked in. He had hung behind to talk to Matt on their way to class when he had realized Keith was feeling better. 

 

**fire.lord4:** Hey, Blue, sorry I got distracted. 

 

Keith sighed and shoved his phone in his pocket. He turned to Lance, who was typing on his computer. “Um, were you supposed to have that out?”

Lance turned slowly, a glare on his face. “Um, were you supposed to care?”

Keith coughed on his own breath. Since when was Lance, like, salty? “Oh, I’m sorry-I didn’t-” As he was talking Lance’s face contorted into a look of shock, apparently at what had come out of his own mouth. 

“Oh my god I’m sorry. I just, I got in my own head and I was mad at someone and I didn’t mean to-”

“That’s okay,” Keith replied, relieved. If there was anything he didn’t want it was for Lance to be angry with him. Not that he cared, but... 

Anyway, he had accidentally sat down next to him, so he figured he should try to at least make up for what happened earlier.

Keith tried smiling at him, maybe that would work. “Yeah, dude, it’s okay, I don’t care.” He looked back at his phone again, figuring the situation was over.

 

* * *

 

Keith’s smile was blinding, Lance realized, as he quickly recounted what had just happened. He had been a bitch! Keith had just tried to talk to him,  _ finally _ , and he had just… what had he even said? He sighed softly.

“Okay, thank you. I’m so sorry, I just-”

“Dude, I don’t care.” Keith was almost chuckling now, and somehow that turned Lance’s stomach and made him feel warm at the same time. Firey would be okay right?  _ I mean… everything seems okay right now.  _ Lance shook his head. What was he thinking?  _ Keith. This is Keith’s fault.  _

“Oh, okay.” He turned back to his computer quickly and looked at the word document in front of him, that he had out for notes.  _ Okay, now to figure out why Keith’s laugh is making my stomach flip.  _ He paused, considering for a millisecond that maybe Pidge had been right about-  _ Ah whatever. _

“Um, Lance. I was wondering if you knew what time class started?” Keith asked, making Lance whip his head around, faster than usual.

He didn’t end up answering though, because that second Shiro walked in. Lance looked up, eye’s locked in front of him so he couldn’t see Keith. He had a feeling if he looked at him his stomach might do another backflip.

Shiro started introducing himself, and doing the first day schpiel. Lance’s eyes drifted back to his computer. 

 

**fire.lord4 has sent you a message**

 

Lance couldn’t help himself from chattering his teeth. Would Firey be mad at him? Would he just ignore everything Lance had said? He clicked on his chat notification and held his breathe.

 

**fire.lord4:** hey, Blue, sorry I got distracted. 

 

Lance inhaled sharply. He looked up, to see Shiro still talking. Keith had his laptop out too now. Lance peeked over at the screen to see some website with a blue background that he was scrolling through. A laugh caught in his throat.

“Keith, are you looking at tumblr?” Keith blinked like a deer in the headlights. 

“Um.” He replied, and then continued scrolling. Lance chuckled.

“It’s okay, I have an account too.” He smiled, leaning further over. Keith shut his computer on what looked like instinct.

“Can you maybe not look at my computer screen?” he asked, somewhat sharply.

“Ah, yeah.” Lance paused and when back to his own computer. “Sorry,” He muttered, looking at Firey’s message again.

 

**fire.lord4:** Hey, Blue, sorry I got distracted. 

 

So was Firey just saying he got distracted and stopped responding? Or…  _ Cause I thought he said he had to go to class?  _ He sighed.  _ Better reply. _

 

**Blue-Waves:** Hey, firey. I’m sorry about earlier, i shouldn’t have mentioned that. I didn’t realize you would get freaked out.

 

Firey didn’t reply immediately. Lance checked again to make sure he wasn’t missing anything. Thankfully Shiro was  _ still _ talking about intro stuff. Keith had opened his computer again and was typing furiously. Suddenly a message popped up on his computer.

 

**fire.lord4:** ah yeah, sorry about that

**fire.lord4:** that wasn’t your fault, i was overstimulated at the time and i just. You going to my school would be really exciting? So I got freaked out cause overstimulation shit and had a panic attack. So sorry

**Blue-Waves:** DUDE OHMYGOD DONT BE SORRY. YOU HAD A PANIC ATTACK? MAN THAT SUCKS SO HARD IM SORRY *hugs very tightly* ugh I cant wait to get out of school so we can watch avatar tonight. Im excited

**fire.lord4:** hah yeah >< me too. I’m in class rn I should probably go, but thanks for understanding

**Blue-Waves:** oh, okay! Bye!

 

Lance sighed a happy sigh. He was wrong, Firey had been fine.  _ Well not fine, exactly _ . _ I mean a panic attack sucks. But he’s not mad? So that’s good I guess.  _ Now relieved, he stretched and leaned back. Keith was looking at Shiro now, who was handing out papers. 

“Um, what are we doing?” he whispered to Keith. Keith rolled his eyes.

“We’re starting color theory first unit, and right now we’re taking notes on the first powerpoint.” Lance smiled. 

“Thanks bro!” He punched him in the shoulder softly, at which Keith recoiled quickly. ”Ah, sorry.”

“That’s okay, I’m just… I get overstimulated.”

Lance stared at Keith for a second, looking straight at his violet colored eyes. He  _ had _ been typing on his computer earlier right? He shook his head and grabbed the worksheet.  _ No, Keith can’t be… No, no way, that would be weird. He’s too… quiet. Firey’s exuberant and excited and yeah okay yup nope. _

He looked at the color theory sheet for a second before glancing back at Keith, who was now facing the front again. He tapped the desk idly as Shiro pulled up the slide, eyelashes fluttering when he blinked. Lance’s throat felt dry. He looked back at the paper.  _ Okay color theory. I aced this section on the entrance test, but they’re probably going to expand a lot. Then again we’re just starting so I probably have nothing to worry about.  _

He looked at Keith again. This might be a long period. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> mwhehehehe Lance is screwed. I love the boy so much, but damn, Lance I wonder why your stomach does backflips when you see Keith. Hm. Anyways, as usual, a reminder that kudos and comments mean the world to me and i'm open to constructive criticism so don't be shy! Thanks for reading.


	6. LJCNDBACJLABDSLJBCVALJCBADJLBS LANCE KEITH OH MY GOD YOU NERDS

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hah the title... exactly how i feel about this chapter.
> 
> anyways I'm so sorry for the long wait I know its been like months or something but I wanted this chapter to be perfect and I also have a bunch of other stuff going on in my life rn. (mainly cosplay... yeah actually just cosplay) Anyways I hope you guys like this chapter as much as I do and remember comments fuel me! I actually only remembered to post this today because of someone's comment so... yeah. ALSO I LOVE YOU GUYS <3 
> 
> and also a PSA because of a lot of negativity going on in the VLD fandom rn, just try to stay positive and out of drama. I don't care if you're an anti, a shaladin, or a homestuck (what) just try to keep your head above water, and not bother other people too much because they have their own reasons for shipping things. And remember if you're uncomfortable with a ship, nobody should force you to see content of that ship! unfollow if you need to! 
> 
> okay I'm shit at pep talks so here's the chapter

Keith pulled his backpack over his shoulder, trying to remind himself why he was walking to homeroom with Lance. Lance who used to try to be friends with him before he shut him out, Lance who he really had pissed off multiple times last year, Lance who from then on considered him his rival.  _ Why had he asked Keith to walk to homeroom with him? _

Keith didn’t mind. He wanted to make up for being a dick. But… why had Lance even given him the chance?

“So…” Lance started, breaking the comfortable silence they had been walking in for the past minute. “I was wondering if you liked Avatar.”

“Huh?” Keith turned. He didn’t mean ATLA, did he? That would be a weirdass coincidence considering his conversation with Blue earlier. For a second he looked into Lance’s sky-colored eyes and felt something familiar. But the edge of a thought slipped away quickly. No, Lance was probably talking about the movie with the blue people. “Oh, um, nah, I’ve never seen that movie.”

Lance looked at his shoes, and Keith was suddenly curious what expression was on his tanned face. 

“Um, I do like other movies,” He started, cringing at how awkward he sounded.

“Oh?” Surprisingly this made Lance perk up. “Like what? Ooh! What are your favorite genres?”

Keith realized he hadn’t thought this far into the conversation. How would Lance react when he told him he was a seventeen year old guy who liked Disney films and cartoons and shit?

“Um, well...” Oh duh. He could tell him about his superhero stuff. Of course, Lance might think he was a nerd then, but that was better than being thought of as a 6 year old girl.

Lance looked at him, expectant. “Um, I really liked the DC animated films.” He said, gripping his hands together. 

“Oh wait, really?” Lance’s smile was so huge, Keith swore it must have hurt. “Ah, I love those! Have you seen the new Teen Titans one? Oh my god, I thought nobody else would be into those at this school.” 

Keith couldn’t help but grin. “Yeah, I saw Juda’s Contract. I really loved the designs they used for the costumes in this one and the first one.” He noticed Lance almost bouncing on the balls of his feet, hands clasped together. 

“Ah!! Yes I loved that one! I need to rewatch that soon.” He said. Now Lance wanted him to talk again, Keith realized after a couple seconds.

Of course, being the socially awkward spaz that he was, Keith didn’t. They continued walking in silence until he realized they were nearing Keith’s advisory classroom. That’s where they would split up. He paused. Should he ask?  _ Ah, fuck it. _

“Um, do you wanna maybe stream that movie tonight?” He paused. “Like, with me?”  _ Oh god, way to make it awkward Keith. _

“Ah, actually I’m busy tonight.” Keith noticed Lance fiddling his hands and he swore he saw red creeping up his face.

“Oh, okay.” Keith cringed at how high his voice sounded. Quickly he added, “Um, well. I have to go to class, ah, cause you see, we’re here and…” He turned, and made eye contact, again noticing those bright blue eyes for some reason, and waved. “Um, bye.” And with that he spun around and headed to class. 

 

* * *

 

Lance was sure his face was red.  _ I mean, now it isn’t. But it was definitely red before. _ He looked into the mirror, rubbing his sweaty palms on his shirt.

“So...” He said to himself. He really didn’t want to be thinking about this right now, right before class, right after talking to Keith, but he figured he had to. “He thought I was talking about the movie… But that doesn’t mean… he could have just thought that’s what I was meant?” He closed his eyes and rubbed them. 

_ God.  _ Keith could easily be Firey, he had come to realize after he had asked him to walk to advisory. He seemed shy at first, but opened up, and ended up being a huge nerd. Just like Firey.  _ But I don’t knowwwwwww.  _ Lance sighed. 

Rubbing his hands on his shirt again, he looked in the mirror contemplatively. The teen rubbed his eyes again.  _ Ugh. So if he is Firey. And I like Firey…  _

Lance shoved that thought out of his head immediately. Not. Right. Now. Nope, he was not going to spend anymore time thinking about if Firey was Keith, Keith with gorgeous violet eyes, Keith who got overstimulated, Keith who he really, really just wanted to-  _ Okay, nope, not thinking about Keith right now. _

Quickly, he washed his hands one more time and knelt down to grab his backpack. He looked over the navy blue bag, covered in pins, eyes landing on one that he had gotten last year in Design Arts. He glanced away quickly, but his eyes were drawn back to the flower on the pin, bright red, and on fire. Of course, it was one of Keith’s designs. He had handed them out the last class before he left, Lance remembered. He had been presenting his final project, finished a month before everyone else. Lance had wondered why he had presented so early, but then he was gone the next week so he figured it had been convenient.

Maybe he had gone on a trip.  _ But wouldn’t he have told us?  _ That was the one thing that still confused Lance. Why had he left? 

Suddenly the door opened and he jumped.

A tall, ashy skinned guy with a beanie walked in, and kinda pushed past him. Lance instinctively shrunk against the wall and then quickly grabbed his backpack, hand clasping the pin, and disappeared out of the bathroom.

Lance shivered. That guy had given him the heebie-jeebies. He took a breath and straightened his backpack and headed toward Building D. Pulling his phone out he swiped right to check his messages. Firey hadn’t written anything. Or… Keith hadn’t writte-  _ No. Nope not thinking about Keith. _

Lance slapped his leg.  _ UGH!  _ How was he going to focus on talking to Firey when he didn’t know who he was? This was ridiculous. He needed to know as soon as possible if Firey was Keith. But… he couldn’t just ask him straight out. That would be weird. 

* * *

Lance let out a sigh as he opened the door to his homeroom class. He was honestly kind of exhausted. This whole first day had been a mess, mostly, and now all he could think of was the subject of that mess. Hecking Keith Kogane. The boy was just- _ Ugh. _

On his way to homeroom Lance had given up avoiding thinking about him. He knew there was something there. The way Keith’s eyes glinted when Lance had said he liked the Teen Titans movie? His stomach had done flips. How could someone be that, like, excited about something? Lance shook his head. _ I’m excited about things all the time! What am I talking about? _

He had a feeling it had to do with the fact that he’d never really seen Keith excited before today.  _ I mean, he’s always be interested in stuff, like class, and teachers, and… _ A realization dawned on Lance. He barely knew Keith. Like, he liked DC animated films, and he’d never watched Avatar the movie. But besides that? Nothing. 

And that was just stuff he had found out like, what, five minutes ago? Had Lance ever even really talked to Keith, like one on one, before just now?

He thought back to sophomore year. First day of school, in his Arts Elective. He had noticed him first because of his mullet.  _ I mean honestly, how could he come into class on the first day of a new school with A MULLET?!  _

Lance had been appalled. Of course, this has led to him constantly looking over at him, because ya know, how can you ignore a mullet? Especially when like, it didn’t look exactly horrible. Like, was he using witchcraft? Cause that was impossible right? For a mullet to look good on somebody? Not good, though. Just… not horrible. Because he wasn’t about to admit that Keith of all people looked good. That would be weird.

Eventually he had gotten up the nerve to talk to the kid, at least maybe ask him about his hair or something, when Keith had been called to the front of the class to sit next to him. 

Well now he had to talk to him. 

“So, um, hi,” Lance had muttered awkwardly.

Keith had looked up and the second thing Lance noticed about him was his eyes. They were violet. Like, soft purple, slightly grayish violet. Was he wearing contacts? Who wore contacts to school?! “Why are your eyes purple?!” Lance had blurted after a couple seconds of awkward silence looking into his weirdo violet eyes. 

Keith had look down, clearly shy. “I got them from my mom, idiot. Why do you think?” He had shuffled his papers and scooted over a seat.

Lance had paused. Somehow he hadn't expected the mullet head, violet eyed pretty boy to be, like, cold. He had quickly looked back at his worksheet and didn't talk to him for the rest of the class. 

Needless to say, since then they had been rivals. Like,  _ not  _ friends. Like that was a thing. And Keith had always been rude to him whenever Lance talked, and at some point, he had started being rude back. And that was the end. Lance had assumed, when Keith left… that maybe he’d never see him again. That that would be all. He would stay just the rival he had sophomore year.

But now? Lance shook himself from his thoughts and went to sit down for Homeroom. Now they had… _what do we have?_ _I guess something must have happened…_

Now Keith was being nice to him, walking with him to advisory, talking.  _ Talking. _ And maybe, if he was Firey, they had been talking all along?

Lance sighed and looked up to see who was supposed to be their homeroom teacher. He was young, with light brown hair and wearing huge coke bottle glasses. Honestly he looked like he had just gotten out of college. He was also Pidge’s brother. 

“Matt!” Lance jumped out of his seat and ran up to lean over the front desk. Class hadn’t started yet, so he figured he could do this. Matt looked up in surprise, but his shocked expression turned soft in an instant. 

“Oh, hi Lance! How ya doing?” He replied, adjusting his glasses slightly.

“How am I doing?! How are you doing? What are you doing? Pidge never told me you were teaching this year!” 

Matt laughed and shook his head. “Yeah I told her not to go spreading the news around. I like to make my own first impressions and you know that would not have happened if I let her gossip about me to all her friends,” He grinned when Lance chuckled at this. “Anyways, go sit down, I have a class to run!”

“Ah fine... You better be a good teacher though!” He winked and then headed back to his seat.  _ Ugh, okay that was really corny.  _ He put a hand to his head, was he getting feverish? His jokes usually got worse when he was sick. His forehead was cold, though.  _ Nope, guess I’m just a doofus.  _

Lance sighed as he sat down. He rummaged through his bag to pull out his laptop before realizing he was in homeroom. He looked up, not sure what to do without having to get out his computer.

Matt stood up, and cleared his throat. “Okay guys, welcome to homeroom! I’m Mr.Holt, but you can call me Matt since this isn’t a formal class. We have a couple of announcements to get through today, and then you guys will be free to go on your phones and goof off.” 

_ Yes. Solution to boredom, found. _

 

* * *

 

Keith shifted in his seat and sighed. Shiro had been droning on about school activities for the better part of ten minutes.  _ Yeah, lucky me to have my brother as an advisor for homeroom.  _ He rolled his eyes. 

Suddenly he felt a buzz in his pocket.  _ Aghhhh. That’s probably Blue, huh?  _ He paused, looking up at Shiro again. 

He had told Blue a huge secret. Well, not exactly a secret but… something you don’t just tell online friends. His panic attacks were a thing he liked to keep private but…  _ He feels safe somehow… I don’t know. _ And Blue might even be going to the same school as him. That had been on his mind all day.

And then there was Lance. Lance, his rival- wait could he still call him that? The thought was sudden, but Keith at least realized, you don’t walk to homeroom with your rival.  _ Oh god, what if I weirded him out?  _ Keith fidgeted in his seat.  _ No, he seemed fine. He talked to me at least? Actually, he did most of the talking. I probably seemed like the one who was weirded out. And he was the one who asked.  _

A lump caught in Keith’s throat. What do you do to return a favor like that? Was walking with someone considered a favor? Were they like,  _ friends _ now? Keith’s thoughts were still spinning when he realized Shiro had stopped talking and people were generally hanging out now. 

He had spotted Pidge across the room earlier, should he go over to her? His phone buzzed again. Immediately he whipped it out.

**Blue-Waves:** okay i think i know a way to figure out if we go to the same place

**Blue-Waves:** ah sorry, do you even want to know?

**fire.lord4:** YES PLEASE OH MY GOD DUDE YOU HAVE NO IDEA

**fire.lord4:** woah okay that sounded desperate whoops XD

**Blue-Waves:** hah no don’t worry, honestly thats half of what I’ve been thinking about today. So my method. Are you ready?

**fire.lord4:** pfft blue stop

**Blue-Waves:** okay okay so I was just in homeroom and our school has a dance next week. Does yours?

**fire.lord4:** wait you’re in homeroom? IM IN HOMEROOM DUD EI THINGK THAT WE MIGHTVNASOGVNAJSK

**Blue-Waves:** firey calm down, do you have a dance?

**fire.lord4:** shit i don’t know i wasn’t listening. I’ll go ask the teacher

 

Keith shoved his phone in his jeans pocket, suddenly giddy with energy. Who was he? Oh god. He could meet him! He could meet him tomorrow! Keith breathed in deeply. 

“Heeeyyyy Shiro,” 

Shiro somehow managed to pull himself away from some kind of syllabus to look up at Keith. “What do you want, Keith?”

“Um, I just wanted to review a couple things you said during the-” he waved his hands around. “You know, the intro thingy.”

Shiro put his elbows up on the desk. “Okay, shoot.” 

“Uh, did you mention a dance or something?” 

Shiro rolled his eyes and sighed. “Keith I spent the entire first five minutes going over the details of the dance and you weren't even listening? I'll tell you tonight.” He then waved his hand, which clearly meant, do away, I’m doing nerd things, so Keith went back to his seat.

 

**fire.lord4:** WE HAVE A DANCE

**Blue-Waves:** OHMYGODOHMYGOD SO YOU GO TO VOLTRON U. TOO

**fire.lord4:** wait why did we not just start with that

**Blue-Waves: ,*,** ~,*,~,*,mystery,*,~,*,~,*,

**fire.lord4:** okay wtf was that emoticon

**Blue-Waves:** you know like the anime sparkles

**fire.lord4:** no

**Blue-Waves:** yes?

**fire.lord4:** e.e

**Blue-Waves:** =^.^=

**fire.lord4:** HNNNNNNNNNNNN

**Blue-Waves:** OH SHIT THE TEACHER IS COMING OVER GTG

 

Keith smiled and put his phone away. So. They went to the same school.

 

* * * 

Lance dropped his phone onto his desk like it was on fire. Okay. So. They went to the same school. And… and… Lance didn’t know how to deal with that!? As soon as they started talking he had gotten a feeling in his gut and just… dropped the conversation. No there wasn’t a teacher coming up to his desk, in fact Matt had been talking to that weird beanie kid at the front of the class for the past five minutes.

But… he couldn’t shake the feeling he was talking to Keith. And if Keith knew who Blue was? What would… he still hated him right?

Lance shuffled his feet. He knew that he had walked to class with him. And that they both liked DC movies? But that wasn’t enough to cure an entire year of straight up loathing right? And… and Keith accepting him all of a sudden… maybe that was a trick. Just another thing to hold above his head, because he was, and always had been, like, better than him.

Lance kicked his shoe into the carpet. Homeroom. He was supposed to be dicking around on his phone, not having an existential crisis about if he had a crush on Keith,  _ Keith _ , Keith who maybe he had always had a crush on but couldn’t admit until now that they were talking over some stupid app like strangers and…

What if it wasn’t Keith? Lance took a breath. There were five hundred kids that had advisory right now. There were 700 kids, counting the lower grade going to a dance in two weeks. The one person that was utterly baffling and confusing him right now couldn’t possibly be firey. There was like, a one in five-hundred chance. 

Lance took a deep breath. He had nothing to worry about. But, now he knew. He wasn’t going to tell firey who he was. Maybe what they had going right now was good enough. He didn’t… he didn’t want to ruin that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IHDALICBADSOICBDOIBCOAID SO THERE
> 
>  
> 
> okay yeah I loved this chapter XD reminder that comments fuel me!! so leave some! criticism is good too!
> 
> also self-plug, my instagram is @mulletweebcosplay if you want to see why I haven't been updating at all
> 
>  
> 
> love you guys and have a nice day! <3


	8. hnnnnn GOD YOU TWO

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ey guys! Just a warning this chapter is kind of short but I wanted to get this one out quicker than last time. I'm hopefully going to be starting the next one soon, and I will be starting another fic with a friend from discord so keep a lookout for that. All your comments are greatly appreciated and you guys are the reason I actually have motivation to continue this fic so thank you very much! As always constructive critiscm is appreciated as long as you're not being a jerk! Have fun reading ^^

Lance walked home in quick rhythmic steps that matched the music coming from his headphones. He was listening to.. Wait what was this song? Ah whatever, the one about like, the blues or something by Fall Out Boy. He was too lazy to check. 

Yeah, that’s why he wasn’t checking. Not like… he had a particular aversion to looking at his phone right now. For any reason. Involving Firey, or.... Nope.  
He hummed along to the beat as he turned onto Kelton St. and sighed. This was a good song, but he just wasn’t feeling… Yeah maybe time to try something else.   
He pressed the button on his headphone cord to skip the song and immediately his favorite KPOP song came on. Ah yeah… You Were Beautiful, the way to get rid of any nerves he had at the moment.

He was halfway through when the song stopped abruptly and his phone started ringing loud in his ears.  _ Ughhh.  _ Honestly, worst feeling ever. 

He pulled his phone out of his pocket to see a facetime message from Pidge. He chuckled a little at the picture he had saved for her, the one where she was making a weird face he screenshotted from facetime, and slid the button right to answer. 

“Hey, what’s up Pidgeon!” He smiled at her, but as the resolution cleared he realized she was scowling into the phone screen.

“Lance...” She said rather menacingly and Lance realized a nervous looking Hunk in the background.

“Oh shit, I forgot.”  
“Yeah, you did. We were gonna walk home together as a group? Not for Lance McClain apparently. Hunk was freaking out thinking you got into an accident or something.”  
“Pidge, I don’t even have a car.” 

She held out her arms. “You know Hunk!” 

“Wait, what does who know about me?” Hunk grabbed the phone out of Pidge’s hands, almost fumbling.

“Hey don’t touch my stuff!” Lance could hear in the background as Hunk’s face appeared onscreen.

“Oh my god, Lance, you’re safe! Thank god!” He sputtered out quickly. Now Lance felt guilty, shit. 

“Ah, yeah, dude, I’m so sorry.” Lance looked down, but kept walking. He was almost halfway home by now anyway.

In a split second, Pidge had the phone back. “Well, we’re gonna catch an Uber home so…” She fumbled around onscreen for a second. “I got my headphones in. Spill.”  
“Wait what do you mean?” Lance’s face started getting slightly red.

“What were you and Keith doing that distracted you.”   
“Wait, wait wait. Me and Keith?” Lance frowned. What was Pidge talking about?

“Okay, so you come into Science not shutting up about Keith and whatever he was doing in Design and Whatever, and then you just don’t show up to our meeting spot? Clearly-”  
“WHAT?!” Lance stuttered. “No, wait, Keith? Why-” He felt his cheeks heating up, burning almost. Okay, so maybe, even if he wasn’t Firey, Lance was starting to realize he might have a crush on Keith. A lowkey crush. Barely a crush. Yeah…  
In a couple seconds Pidge’s face went from tense and angry looking to a huge grin. “Oh, wow you really do like him!” She giggled. Lance’s face got redder. “I mean, I kinda sensed something last year but-”

“Okay, stop! Stop right now. I don’t like Keith. He’s just a new friend, you know. Like, we’re getting over the whole rivalry thing. That’s all.” He rubbed the back of his neck as a blush creeped up his cheeks. Pidge, of course, being the little gremlin she was, stayed silent to let Lance dwell in the awkwardness. “Okay, okay, next subject!” He spurted out. 

PIdge smiled and closed her eyes. “Okay, fine…” She said, as Lance noticed her getting into the car. 

“What excuse did he make about Keith?” He heard Hunk ask as he shuffled into the car next to Pidge. Lance rolled his eyes, and covered his face in his hands to hide another blush. He couldn’t believe he was finally admitting his crush on Keith on the first day of Junior year.

He thought back to that first day in homeroom, sophomore year and frowned. Keith had rejected him. Obviously not like… that… but he had clearly rejected him as a friend. He had barely talked to him for the rest of the year even though they had been seat partners. And that had been fine. Lance would just stare at his fingers tapping his desk until Keith would finally say something about him shutting up. But at least Lance had gotten to hear his voice. Their relationship went on like that. Lance dying for attention, Keith being ignorant. 

And then he had disappeared. And now… now he was back and answering his questions and having conversations and damn, Lance had a crush on him.

What had happened between them? 

Lance had a feeling Firey had something to do with this.

He was sidetracked from his thoughts when he realized his headphones had gone quiet. 

“Lance are you okay?” Pidge asked quickly as he looked up. 

“Uh, Oh- Yeah. Yes..” He answered, seeing a concerned Hunk peer onscreen. He managed a quick, Lance-patented grin. He hadn’t heard what Pidge had answered to his question but right now he didn’t care that much. “Pidge, can we talk later? I need to…” 

Pidge nodded quickly. “Bye dude!” She said, hanging up. Lance let out a sigh. This was ridiculous. He needed to figure things out. 

 

**Blue-Waves:** eYYYYYyYyYy

**fire.lord4:** woah edgy how are you

**Blue-Waves:** fabulous, just been distracted BY YOU ALL DAY YOU JERK

**fire.lord4:** hnnn? why?

**Blue-Waves:** dude, do you not remember we go to the same school

**fire.lord4:** OH OMG YES I FORGOT I WAS GOING HOME AND GAHAIDCGHDIASHGCOIJ

**Blue-Waves:** firey… if i didn’t love you i would literally be like.. So disapointed   
  
Lance’s breath caught in his throat the second after he hit send. How? How had he typed that so easily and just? Sent it? Oh no, fuck fuck fuck- Wait...

 

**fire.lord4:** lmao yeah Im sorry

 

And bam, Firey was acting totally normal. Okay this was weird.  _ Do friends just say they love eachother now? WTF Firey?? _

 

**Blue-Waves:** wait wait wait

**fire.lord4:** yeah?

**Blue-Waves:** dude I just said I loved you.. And you? Didn’t freak out?  
**fire.lord4:** oh...

**Blue-Waves:** I MEAN

**fire.lord4:** oh damn you did XDD

**Blue-Waves:** (GOD THAT XD IM GONNA KILL YOU SOMEDAY) 

**fire.lord4:** pfft so.. How did you mean that?

**Blue-Waves:** um

**fire.lord4:** ??? like? Do you have a crush on me or?

 

Lance literally almost tripped. WHAT THE FUCK? WHY WAS HE SO CHILL? This- okay no matter how sure he was, no matter that feeling in his gut that just screamed Keith… This couldn’t be Keith.

 

**fire.lord4:** Blue?

**Blue-Waves:** CAN WE BE INTERNET BOYFRIENDS

 

Lance made a mental note to cut off his fingers later so he could never text again. Why were they doing this?! He was gonna freak him out! FUCK!!!!

 

**fire.lord4:** BWAHHAHA omg yes totally

**Blue-Waves:** like… actually? What if you don’t like me once you get to know me better.. What if … what if you already know me and you hate me or something and

 

**fire.lord4 is typing...**

 

 **Blue-Waves:** FIRE DO YOU MEAN THAT??  
**fire.lord4:** of course. I’ve liked you for a while dude XD

**Blue-Waves:** okay okay okay you need to like… calm with the killing me here

**fire.lord4:** ah sorry man. I’m feeling really good this afternoon ><

**Blue-Waves:** no! That’s okay! I want you to feel good

 

Lance took a few deep breaths when firey took a while to reply. Not Keith. Firey. He could not handle being internet boyfriends with Keith right now so he wasn’t going to. 

 

**fire.lord4:** I… so… we’re boyfriends?

**Blue-Waves:** I guess XD

**fire.lord4:** HAH MY EMOTICON IS CATCHING

**Blue-Waves:** oh god you got me there… shit, being boyfriends with an XD-er is going to be HORRIBLE

**fire.lord4:** lmao I take it you’re feeling better? 

**Blue-Waves:**  Hah, yeah. I’m just.

**fire.lord4:** OH FUCK

**Blue-Waves:** WHAT

**fire.lord4:** dude we were watching avatar tonight right??

**Blue-Waves:** OHMYGOD YES

**fire.lord4:** we shouldn’t voicechat though right?

**Blue-Waves:** nah, honestly I like the mystery

**fire.lord4:** you mean the

**fire.lord4: ,*,** ~,*,~,*,mystery,*,~,*,~,*,

**Blue-Waves:** I love you

**fire.lord4:** love you too babe gtg

 

And then Lance actually tripped. He held his phone up desperately, before it clattered to the ground. Getting up slowly, he heaved a deep breath and leaned down to pick up his phone. Firey’s last text glared brightly from his phone screen.  _ Babe.  _

Okay so now he had a boyfriend. Who cares if he’s on the internet or he’s Keith or IF HE’S ACTUALLY PIDGE CATFISHING HIM BECAUSE DAMN HE HAS A BOYFRIEND???

Lance closed his eyes, turned his phone off, and looked up. He had made his way home without even noticing. He walked up the steps slowly, taking heavy breaths. This was… insane? He had never had a boyfriend? And suddenly Keith- No, Firey, seemed even more cute? And just… he had called him babe? Like????

Okay, honestly, what was happening?

 

* * *

Keith rubbed his eyes. The nerves that had appeared after he said bye to Blue had only lasted a few minutes, thank god. Honestly, he had known they would. He had been friends with Blue for about two months now.. And? Well he trusted him. And yeah there was that part where he thought he was adorable when he used weird emoticons and all caps and…

So of course Keith had said yes. Being internet boyfriends wasn’t much of a commitment, just a title for a friendship he already had. And he had a feeling that Blue wouldn’t push meeting in person, so this was safe. 

Keith was sprawled out on his bed, a sheet curled around one foot. His right hand was laying off the side of the bed in a lame attempt to pick up his phone that he had given up on five minutes ago because, no, he wasn’t going to move. 

He stared up at his glowing star-speckled ceiling and sighed. Sitting up, he unfurled his foot from the sheet and looked down at his ankle. There were flames there, tattooed last year, at the beginning of the year when everything had been going good. Shiro had let him get the tattoo for his birthday and honestly? Best birthday gift in the world. The flames curled around his ankle and one day he hoped he could extend them to his leg. For now though, Shiro insisted he keep things at below-combat-boots level. Keith didn’t understand this, mainly because he almost never wore shorts but he figured Shiro might be right just in case he was forced to take gym again next year. 

Looking up again, his eyes drifted around his room, landing on his laptop.  _ Oh shit.  _ What time was it?  Keith quickly leaned over to grab his phone off the floor beside his bed and promptly fell on his face. Flailing to sit up, he checked the time and… Thank God, it was only 5:30. 

_ Okay, so half an hour before Blue calls.  _ Keith noted silently.  _ Hmm… _

He decided maybe talking to Shiro wouldn’t be such a bad idea. Getting up, Keith looked down to remember he was only wearing boxers. He hurriedly grabbed a pair of sweatpants off his bed and put them on, before walking out into the living/dining room of Shiro and his apartment. 

Of course Shiro was on his laptop, headphones on, clearly on a facetime call or voicechat or something. 

“Hah, yeah, the kids are ridiculous. Today my brother-- You know Keith right? --He came up to me in the middle of class and asked if there was a dance! Like, Keith-” Shiro froze as he noticed Keith standing in the doorway.

“So, gossiping with your boyfriend about me?” He said, a small smirk tugging across his lips. 

Shiro’s face turned beet red as he looked at his computer. “Ah, no, Matt I just- Um… one second, Keith’s here.”

Keith’s brother unplugged his headphones and got up, walking over to Keith. As soon as he got close enough so that he thought Matt couldn’t hear, he started whisper-yelling. 

“Keith!! He doesn’t know I like him… like that. You can’t just-” 

Matt’s voice sounded from the computer. “Uh, yeah I do.” Keith tried to stifle his laughter as Shiro’s face got redder. “Shiro, you think I’m that oblivious?” He added in a fake-upset tone, and Keith couldn’t help himself. He doubled over laughing as Shiro raced back to his computer, face white with shock. 

Keith decided right now might not be the best time to talk to Shiro. He went back into his room still giggling, realizing he was still holding his phone. He immediately opened his chat app on instinct. His stomach was buzzing with excitement and he smiled as he sawe his most recent conversation with Blue. The realization that he was… like, well, In A Relationship (He thought so at least) dawned on him anew. What if Blue wanted to facetime one day? Would he go red like Shiro once he found out who he was? Would he even like him any more? What if he knew him already?

For a second a memory came to mind. First day of sophomore year, sitting at the back of the classroom, his name was called. He had been small and shy back then, pretty much the same as now, except he had grown a few inches and gotten slightly more muscle from starting his workout regimen. But, point withstanding, he had been reluctant to make any friends.

So his name had been called and he was forced to switch seats, to the one right in the center in the front of the room. And he had been pissed. So when a rather annoyingly attractive looking teen had started asking him stupid questions he had shut him down immediately. He needed quiet, not a noisy deskmate.

As quickly as the memory came, Keith was distracting himself. He didn’t want to think about last year and all the mistakes he had made out of fear. Now he was friends with the attracti- Lance, he was friends with Lance, or at least he thought. And he kind of had a friend group? So for the first day, things were going pretty well. Besides that panic attack. But those happened pretty often and once they were gone, they were gone, so...

Keith sighed and flopped onto his bed. He checked the time again. Okay so only 5 minutes had passed. Now what? 

Suddenly his phone pinged.  

 

**Blue-Waves:**  eyyy bab

**fire.lord4:** pfft bab what kind of word is that

**Blue-Waves:** like? Like babe but bab

**fire.lord4:** ???

**Blue-Waves:** okay pls tell me you have an insta and youve heard it there

**fire.lord4:** whats an insta

**Blue-Waves:** OVWUBJOBWJLRVBWEOEBFKJWEBVJOWEBOU

**fire.lord4:** heh you get so flustered

**Blue-Waves:** YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT INSTAGRAM IS?!?

**fire.lord4:** ohhhh instagram. Yeah thats the photographer thing

**Blue-Waves:**  oh,,, my ,,, god,,,, 

**Blue-Waves:** Firey I might have to cancel our boyfriendship

**fire.lord4:** whaaa I’m sorry Im mainly just a videogamer, I don’t do all that social media stuff

**Blue-Waves:** okay,,, i gues,, i can forgive you 

**fire.lord4:** thanks bab 

**Blue-Waves:** o.O

**fire.lord4:** hehehe

**Blue-Waves:** DAMN FIREY YOU ARE FUCKING FLIRTY TODAY

**fire.lord4:** god no, I cant flirt!

**Blue-Waves:**  idk, I’d say you’re a space man.

**fire.lord4:** ???

**Blue-Waves:** BECAUSE YOURE OUT OF THIS WORLD

**fire.lord4:** was that… a pickup line

**Blue-Waves:** YES, ONE OF MY MANY SPECIALTIES

**fire.lord4:** ey, blue can we watch avatar early?

**Blue-Waves:** hnn WAIT OH YEAH I FORGOT

**fire.lord4:** get on the streaming thing I’m pulling up ep 1

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HNNN I LOWKEY LOVED HOW I WROTE THIS CHAPTER
> 
> Okay so sidenote, I'm realizing now a lot of things I would want to re-do with this fic, so heads up, I might rewrite this fic in the future. Um, I guess that's all? So yeah, thanks for reading!
> 
>  
> 
> I talk about fic progress on @mulletweebcosplay on instagram, and you can find my tumblr @treerainbellabina


	9. gahhh im sorry my dudes

Hey guys, I know I've been gone for a while, and although I've been responding to comments I haven't been updating. Although I was optimistic I would continue writing this fic just a few days ago, I realized since I have worked on chapter 8 its been about 4 months. In that time my writing has changed a lot (hopefully for the better) and I have a lot of things I want to change about the past chapters of this fic, and just reading them makes me really want to start over. Since I'm doing this for fun, I don't really want to force myself to continue something that I don't really love anymore, and because of that I'm not going to be continuing this fic. I'm so thankful for all the positive feedback you guys have been giving me and I'm really, really sorry I have to do this, but I will continue writing on here, though maybe focusing more on one-shots while I continue to improve my writing skills. I'm so grateful for everyone of you that left kudos or a nice comment because now I feel like an actual writer?? and like, thats a great feeling! Again I'm so sorry, I feel like I'm kind of letting you all down, but I also know I will be making a lot more, better content in the future, so I hope y'all can bear with me. Thanks for understanding my dudes, and thanks for all you've done, reading my fic!


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